Facing Your Fear

It’s ten days until November. For many writers around the world November is when they take a deep breath and plunge into NaNoWriMo. (National Novel Writing Month.) 

The aim is to write 50,000 words by the 30^th.

50,000 words seems like a huge mountain to climb. Fear of the task can paralyse you so that you don’t get started at all. Rachel Thompson has 4 tips to overcome your fear of writing.

Joanna Penn has a great interview with Grant Faulkner where he talks about how NaNoWriMo got started and the origins of the 100 word story site.

You can sign up for NaNoWriMo and find your local group to support you or just beaver away at home.

Roz Morris has an excellent post on pace and structure to help with your NaNo planning and Bookworks has one on Time Management strategies for authors.

October is often called NaNoPrepMo. It is much easier to write 50,000 words if you know what you are going to write first. Jami Gold has her brilliant worksheets for authors available to download so you are all prepared for NaNoWriMo. 

Out in the world Mike Shatzkin has been taking a look at the latest Author Earnings data. He concludes that Bob Mayer was right with his post everything old is new again. Traditional publishers have now figured out how to use the new world of ebook publishing but there are differences in approach.

Kristine Rusch has an interesting post on  how writers can be overwhelmed. The solution is to define exactly what you want to be and or achieve.

Anne R Allen has a great post on the latest twists and turns of the Amazon review policy. This post is getting widely shared. Anne is a treasure trove of useful information and this post lays out what you can and can’t do regarding the new rules of reviews on Amazon.

Susan Spann writes about the intricacies of the advance in contracts. If you have ever wondered how it all works? What earning out means? How advances are calculated? This is the post for you.

In The Craft Section,

Fixing fatal flaws- Janice Hardy- Bookmark

Story and Structure love- James Scott Bell

3 ways to spot telling- K M Weiland- Bookmark

How to write excellent plot twists- Ava Jae

Synopsising your way to revision success-Writer Unboxed - Bookmark

Finding your character special hook and Pacing- Angela Ackerman- Bookmark

Act 2 The dark night of the soul -Sara Letourneau - Bookmark

Where does your drama come from- Lisa Cron - Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

Two great post from Rachel Thompson-What is a media kit and why you need one- Bookmark and How do you build an audience before you have a product.

Facebook funnels that convert- Moz

Launching A Series- Great podcast with Lindsay Buroker

Book promotion- Do this Not that- The Book Designer

Push marketing or Pull marketing- Jane Friedman- Bookmark

To Finish,

John Green has been acknowledged as a Y A writing superstar. While other writers may envy him his success has not come easy. In a very candid interview he discusses his battle with Writers Block and mental health. Sometimes all you can do is feel the fear and keep going.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons - sinister blue box  

If you want to get a selection of the months best links and other fear busting ideas you should subscribe to my monthly newsletter.

Learning On The Job

I’ve been thinking lately about the way publishing works these days. 

Ten years ago it was find an agent or editor and pitch your work. Keep trying and learning and maybe they will like it and you will get published. 

Five years ago it was ditch that traditional route and self publish... just put it out there and find your audience. 

Now it feels like a convergence.

To succeed in this business you have to go in with an attitude of learning and improving your craft. This applies for both sides of the publishing coin. This excellent post by Jamie Raintree explores the ‘act as if’ mindset and planning your career first.

While you are digesting that, Jane Friedman has written about standing out to agents and editors.... This is good advice people.

As you are learning about the publishing business stop and look at Kris Ruschs deal breaker posts. This week she looks at agent contracts.You should be keeping one eye on the gold and both eyes on the scams and navigating your way around.

Publishing Perspectives has an interesting interview with Sarah McIntyre, the illustrator behind the campaign #PicturesMeansBusiness. This is a great campaign and a must read for every children’s book author and publisher out there!

Lindsay Buroker is a great writer and one of the hosts of SFF marketing podcast. She writes an informative blog as well. Recently she wrote about genre hopping and how to do it successfully as a writer.

This week Wattpad introduced inside the story advertising. This was predicted about three years ago as one of those ‘and then the world will have gone to hell’ scenarios. But Wattpad being digital and wanting to help the authors has said use the space between chapters. Is it a win/win?

In the ‘what will they think of next, Section,

Augmented Reality. (A.R.) Now think of bookstores. Now put the two together. It’s like playing Pokemon Go on the bookshelves. Especially designed for kids...

In The Craft Section,

Two great articles on writing dialogue- Bookmark Both

Fantastic dialogue tips – Now Novel and Editing dialogue- Jane Friedman

Writing sex scenes

5 crime fiction blunders to avoid

3 ways to build a better plot- Janice Hardy

Writing complex characters- K M Weiland – Bookmark

Writing from the opposite genders point of view

Building and keeping suspense

Character Arc development – Jami Gold Bookmark

In The Marketing Section,

5 guerilla tactics for promoting your book

When you’ve finished your first novel, what do you do- Anne R Allen-Bookmark

Keyword use on Amazon- Penny Sansevieri - Bookmark

The importance of your author photo

Print is still important- Elizabeth S Craig- Bookmark (and read comments)

Marketing on a budget

Creating the author business plan- Janice Hardy - Bookmark

To Finish,

These days you can write from anywhere and many writers do. Give me wifi and a coffee is the writers cry. However to be a productive digital nomad takes a little more savvy. Here is a list of productivity tips for your next foray of writing in the wild... or your nearest coffee shop

Maureen

@craicer

Get a selection of the months best links and other on the job learning when you subscribe to my monthly newsletter.

Pic: Flickr/ Creative Commons/ Pedro Simoes 

Failure Planning In This Writing Business

This week I was discussing the abuse of interns with an economist (as you do.) He was highlighting how tech interns are offered lots of unpaid work as a leg up in the industry. Its not a leg up... it’s a leg shackle. This morning The Bookseller had an article pointing the finger at unpaid internships in publishing. (Arrgh – not in my own industry! I thought we were better than that...) I have seen Internships advertised now and again on Twitter... and they ask for writers mostly. So go in with your eyes open!

Kristine Kathryn Rusch has sideways jumped with her blog series on Contracts and Deal Breakers. Prince’s lack of a will raises some huge issues for any creative legacy. Recently Kris was editing an anthology and saw at first hand what a mess some writers literary estates were in. This is an important issue. And yes it applies to you! Take the time to read her article and think about what you can put in place in the unfortunate event...

If you are thinking like a business owner... and you should be... Molly Greene has an excellent article on Business Plans for Authors this week. This is a quick run through of the basics that you should be covering.

Anne R Allen has a great post for new writers about ways they can derail their writing careers before it even starts. This is a good post to share around. I have come up against these attitudes from writers and I just wince.

This week Catherine Ryan Howard had her first Traditional Fiction book published.  Catherine Caffienated has been a popular go to blog for anybody learning about self publishing. She is funny and honest as she learned in public and helped countless others on the way with her non fiction books. So why go traditional with fiction? As part of her promotion she has an excellent blog post on killer twists.

The Marketing SFF podcast is always a great learning resource to dip into. This week the team interviewed best selling series writer Garrett Robinson and it was a cracker! Garrett writes in public on YouTube. It’s almost performance art... Spend some time with this podcast and get mind blown!

Audible is doing an interesting thing. They are allowing subscribers to gift an audible book for free. I’m trying to see the catch. You get to still own the book. The creators still get paid as if it’s a real sale... you don’t have to buy the book again. Sounds wonderful!

In the Craft Section,

How to avoid sagging middles

How to write deep POV- Ava Jae- Bookmark

6 rules to keep Critique Partners golden

Take your reader to another world- Writer Unboxed

How to avoid plotting mistakes

Colouring in scenes

What writers may not know about the 3 act structure- C S Lakin- Bookmark

Building the movie in our minds- Jami Gold - Bookmark

In the Marketing Section,

5 Marketing ways to revive your series- Janice Hardy

How to podcast – Joanna Penn

21 ways a reader might find your website

Susan Spann has written an excellent series on right in contracts. These are Bookmark posts! 

Subsidiary rights and Merchandising rights in publishing deals. Read and have your eyes opened!

Penny Sansevieri has a great post on live streaming on Facebook- and other epic Facebook marketing tips- Bookmark

To Finish,

If you are a fan of writing inspiration quotes, a few children’s writers explain their secrets to writing successful books.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons- Abductit

Taking The Long View

In the children’s publishing world Bologna Children’s Book Fair is the big date on the annual calendar. It is just finishing as I write so all the commentaries about the fair will be out during the week. However Publishers Weekly has a day one impressions piece. In other Children’s Book News, today the brilliant  Meg Rosoff  won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award  for her career achievements. 

This week Hugh Howey gave an interview for DBW where he set out in his forthright way what the publishers should be doing now and into the future.

Mike Shatzkin, who programmes the DBW conference, then replied in his forthright way where he thought Hugh was right and where he thought Hugh was completely wrong.

Both of these articles are good reads. As always read the comments where you get a fuller sense of the conversations around both points of view.

Two people who have much to say on publishing and writing are Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith. They both keep a sharp eye on the industry and have tremendous business smarts.

Kris is starting a new Business Musings series on Contracts and specifically deal breakers in contracts. Kris starts out by saying she was hoping that contracts would have improved in the three years since she wrote her book on Contracts but sadly they haven’t. With Author Societies calling for fairer contracts in the US and UK, writers need to keep these posts in their must read list.

Dean has a tremendous work ethic and works hard at explaining the writing business. He doesn’t suffer fools and has nothing to prove to anyone. This week he was a little taken aback when he was accused of devaluing the novel art-form because he wrote a novel in a week. Riiiiight.

Joel Friedlander is another publishing practitioner who has a must read blog. This week he looks at what Self Publishers can do when they find their books have been pirated.

Nathan Bransford still has interesting things to say about the publishing business. This week he comments on a New York Times article about focus groups being asked to read unpublished novels and mark where they stopped reading so the publishers can figure out how much money to spend on marketing.

In the Craft Section,

Making your plot less episodic- The Editors Blog-Bookmark

Making a series outline- Better Novel Project-Bookmark

Storyboarding your novel

Dramatic momentum or End of Chapter buttons-Writers in the 

Storm-Bookmark

Beginning your story with setting

Crafting a compelling story

How to write an epilogue that works- KM Weiland

5 steps to take before you start your next story

In the Marketing Section,

Joanna Penn on changing book titles and covers.- Bookmark

Lindsay Buroker on finding more categories for your keywords

How to pitch non fiction influencers to get your book noticed

Promote a new release by marketing a series-Megg Jensen -

Bookmark

Things to think about before publishing.

BadRedheadMarketing AKA Rachel Thompson on her top author marketing tips

To Finish,

This coming week Beverley Cleary turns 100 years old. Her books have touched the lives of millions of children around the world. We all love Henry and Ribsy, Beezus and Ramona and a whole cast of characters from neighbourhoods just like ours. She has had a remarkable publishing career which started when one little boy marched up to her library desk and asked 'where are the stories about kids like me.'

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Beverley Cleary Born 12 April 1916

Chasing The Reader

This week in the publishing blogosphere

Scribd changed its subscription model. A little shiver fluttered through the online publishing community at the news. Were they going to fold? With the dominance of Amazon Unlimited and the demise of Oyster, Scribd is really the only alternative in subscription reading. Scribd still lives but the day of the all you can read buffet is ending.

This week Google entered into the reading market... with books that cannot be printed.

These books aren’t even for e-readers. They are short, just right for a commute and designed to be read on a phone.... and they are choose your own adventure type books. Taking the story and gaming it into your phone challenges conventional storytelling. With Google behind this experiment it will be interesting to see where it goes.

At the end of January, Berlin hosted a Future Publish conference. One of the keynote speakers, Chantal Restivo-Alessi, talked about the value of the story across all mediums, harnessing digital across all platforms and building deep engagement. Backlists are crucial and Authors and their brand should be marketed on a global scale. This is a really interesting article. (I can't help wondering what it would do for NZ if the individual imprints here marketed NZ Books globally instead of to two chain booksellers.)

Jane Friedman has an interview with Agent Laurie McLean specifically about one of her clients who operates in a hybrid fashion across the publishing and music industries with one feeding into the other. So Simon Curtis writes a Y.A. book and happens to create music and so references it in the story and brings out an album of music which promotes the book which promotes his music and.... Hybrid storytelling going in all directions now.

By now your brain has probably gone into Popcorn Kitten mode so you should read what James Scott Bell has to say about coping with the writers bane of too many ideas crowding in all at once. This is excellent advice which will keep you productive or at least allow you to sleep easier.

Writer Beware is continuing to warn authors about the many and varied scams that Author Solutions are perpetuating across all their various fronts for reputable publishing companies. The latest examination is the marketing on-sell. This is where they really make their money charging hundreds of dollars for simple services. The charges are truly eye-watering. Even if you know that you will never get caught on this - read it so you can inform others.

Jami Gold has been thinking about the times when an Author might work for free. This is hotly debated in the creative community where we see little enough money for our work. A few weeks back we had Phillip Pullman campaigning to pay authors at festivals. Jami has some good points to make about choosing carefully which projects we do for free.

I have been thinking about Dean Wesley Smith's article all day. He takes a look at the longevity of the writer in the digital age. It does make you think. If books don’t go out of print because digital backlists are still selling... authors really need to understand the long game and plan their careers for it. Dean is still finding readers for books that are 30 years old... and you can too.

In the Craft Section,

The Book Designer- 3 mistakes you made writing the first book.

Tara Sparling- Dissecting the blurb formula

September Fawkes – 15 tactics for writing humour- Bookmark

What not to do when writing for teens

Steven Pressfield -The difference between subject and theme- Bookmark

Effective outlining in Scrivener using metadata

Anne R Allen – a guide to co writing -Bookmark

Darcy Pattison- find your novel opening

Janice Hardy – Deep P.O.V is not the only P.O.V.

In the Marketing Section,

Rachel Thompson- 4 ways to improve your sales

How to promote your book

Anne R Allen- Using Google plus and why you should. (This post is getting a lot of comments 

around the blogosphere. You should read it!)

How writers ruin their Amazon links- Bookmark!

Jane Friedman on finding a Book Publicist

Ways Authors can reach Readers

Website of the Week

Besides being an awesome blogger Lindsay Buroker manages a podcast called SFF Marketing. This podcast is a deep look at marketing issues and has great guests. Being a podcast it’s easy to listen to while doing other things. Today they interviewed Data Guy of Author Earnings. The latest Author Earnings report is ruffling a few feathers. Data Guy is being touted as a guest at Digital Book World’s upcoming conference so this podcast is a must listen if you are following what is happening in the Indie World. Then you can check out all the other goodies in past podcasts.

To Finish,

Angela Ackerman writes some great articles.  This one for Romance University on romancing the reader is a must read. After all readers are why we spend so much time crafting the characters. We want them to love our characters as much as we do.

Loving the reader means we have to show up for them. 

This week the annual SCBWI conference in New York was rocked by an amazing keynote from children's author Gary Schmidt. Besides reading the keynote... check out the great conference blog.

Maureen

@craicer

Pic : Flickr /Creative Commons/ Rene Schwietzke

The Trials Of Growing Up

In publishing news this week...

The news is filtering through about mega selling YA Author Cassandra Clare being taken to court over plagiarism by another big selling YA author Sherilyn Kenyon. This is an interesting case as it hinges on whether you can plagiarise an idea. 

While authors digest that one- if you were thinking of translating into German you need to understand that titles are copyright protected in Germany. Joanna Penn talks to Rebecca Cantrell about this and other meaty topics in the hybrid world of publishing.

A new Author Earnings survey is out. For the first time they included print books. The numbers make interesting reading. Traditional publishing still holds up Print... but the Indies are not far behind.

This week Nielson announced that they have decided to track ebooks. This is slightly after the fact as ebooks have been around for a few years now. However the data may be useful in the future.

Publishing will be rubbing their hands at the news that an 8th Harry Potter book is about to be launched on July 31^st in print and ebook. This is the book of the script of the play which also opens in July. With over 70,000 fully illustrated books of Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone (retailing in NZ at $70) sold in the last three months, I’m going to predict that there will be a market for this book featuring a grown up Harry Potter. Add to that a new expanded version of Fantastic Beasts and all things Potter will be the publishing saviour of 2016.

Outside the phenomenon of Harry Potter, Children’s Books receive very little review space in print media. A UK author has launched a campaign to try and redress this. This has been picked up by The Bookseller magazine with an article about why these reviews are so important.

Jami Gold has an interesting article on the dilemma for the writer of a public life for a private individual. 

Janice Hardy has an interesting article by Marcy Kennedy on the single biggest mistake authors make... and its important... BACKUP. Marcy details the ways you can fix this!

Jane Friedman has a guest post by Ursula Wong on writer groups and co ops. This is a comprehensive how to article on what types of groups are around, what they do and how they can be set up. 

I have long been an advocate of writer groups... of all kinds. They can be a great support individually and can morph into small publishing companies.

After all that’s how Bloomsbury started and look who they first published... J K Rowling

In the Craft Section,

How to write open ended endings

10 tips for trimming a lengthy manuscript

Kathryn Goldman-When and when not to use Trademarks- Bookmark!

K M Weiland - 5 reasons a book is re readable- Bookmark

Anne R Allen- How to hook the reader- Bookmark

Kristine Rusch on The Serious Writer Voice- Bookmark!

Jane Friedman on Creating Audiobooks

In the Marketing Section,

Writeitsideways has a nifty post on 4 steps to take forAuthor Branding.

Jane Friedman looks at whether paid book reviews are worth it- Bookmark

Writers in the Storm has a great post on helping your readers to write good reviews

Lindsay Buroker has a great post on Amazon adverts for authors- read the comments!

Promote a book without using Social Media

Miral Slatter has a great post on putting together a marketing plan for your book. Bookmark

Joel Friedlander has a post on the importance of keywords for Amazon

If you still need help with websites and ideas check out FirstSiteGuide. Lots of interesting articles.

Passive Guy links to an excellent article on going exclusive or going everywhere with your book

To Finish,

If you are thinking about productivity apps- here is a full on one- Flowstate... keep typing or lose all the words you have written. No time for musing or looking at kitten pictures... I wonder if J K Rowling uses this.

Maureen

@craicer

Sparking Ideas

My brain is still buzzing from Tinderbox – that and I’m finding myself falling asleep at odd times. Some of this, I’m told, is body readjustment after a long campaign of heightened stress levels. I put it down to operating on about 3 hours sleep a night for a week.

For those of you who have never been on a committee putting a big event together... there are many behind the scenes details to organise. We started planning Tinderbox 18 months ago, scoping out what we wanted to have at our conference and researching who would be the best fit to deliver it. We had to do all this with one eye on the changing publishing marketplace. With themes established then it was booking presenters in and finding a suitable venue. Booking your presenters early is key! Along with the quality of the presenters the following list can make or break a conference, food, wifi, room size, assessments, hands on workshops, goodie bags and transport. All of this needs to be tied down early so that if anything falls over you have time to fix it.

Tinderbox was fantastic! The presenters were inspiring, the food was amazing and the high creative energy of the delegates was encouraging. My team were called Goddesses and I bow down before them. And the Wifi stayed on, with a little help.

Meanwhile in the outside world....

Stephanie Meyer sent the publishing world into the Twilight zone... with a gender bent version of Twilight.

Waterstones – the biggest bookshop chain in the UK decided that they would cease to sell the Kindle, apparently because e-publishing is failing.

Porter takes a look at whether Print is really triumphing, while Traditional publishers are joining Kindle Unlimited.

Yup everybody is still mixed up.

Stephan Pinker, Linguistics Professor and International Grammar Guru, declared that writing rules were only superstitions.

Macquarie University published their findings on authors in Australia which makes fascinating reading. Your average Aussie author is a woman, writing genre fiction, earning twelve grand.

In Florida the Novelists Inc (NINC) conference wrapped up. This conference is for novelists who have had two or more books published. Elizabeth S Craig has a round up of what was discussed at the conference. Very interesting takeaways here...

In The Craft Section,

NaNoWriMo is coming up so here are 7 ways to keep it going throughout the year.

5 tips for making writing a daily habit (Bookmark)

Hiring a freelance editor

How authors and editors can work well together

How to hook readers - Setting the stage and Puzzle Pieces

Understanding Point Of View

Style Sheets and Guides -Ruth Harris (Bookmark)

In The Marketing Section,

Can serials be profitable in Kindle Unlimited?- Lindsay Buroker (Bookmark)

Translate your book with Bablecube

6 tips for finding a cover artist- Jami Gold

How to Twitter tips- Molly Greene (Bookmark)

5 lessons learned between debut and second book

Website Of The Week

Inky Girl has a newsletter. This is a great resource for all those artists out there. 

And the Bookshelf Muse Library software is launched!

To Finish,

The Ten commandments of Indie Publishing is a very good pep talk for writers as is Jane Friedman’s Author Business models, a must read!

As I was putting together this roundup I was struck by the fact that many these links were ideas discussed at Tinderbox. Just add coffee and an enthusiastic crowd soundtrack. Or make plans to go to the next National conference in two years time.

To bed to bed….

Maureen

@craicer

Pic Flickr Creative Commons / S J Liew

Villains and Heroes

This week doing the publishing rounds....

That RITA book.

That Watchman book refund.

That guy who yanked his book from St Martin’s Press.

There are plenty of sides to each story... tho the RITA saga has left me scratching my head on how it even got published. (The RITA’s are the Oscar’s of the Romance world.) This book was nominated and finalled in two categories. Just dodgy on so many levels...

Then we have an Indie bookstore giving refunds for the latest Harper Lee book to disappointed readers. OK readers you were warned about the hype around it. You were told it was an untouched early MS... (possibly a money grab by the publishers.) The Guardian let off some steam around this.

This week’s epic marketing fail.

So you think you have a pretty solid career with your big NY publisher. You’ve won awards, earned out etcetc. Then your latest book (with starred reviews already) gets yanked before publication. Heard it all before... but this time it is the author that has yanked the book because the publisher lied about the marketing campaign. (Takes writer guts to do it.)

Brooke Warner has written a piece about the lengths some Traditional publishers are going to control their writer's marketing lives. Stopping writers giving endorsements to other writers being one of them. Isn’t it supposed to be a win/win marketing strategy?

Catherine Nicholls decided to try a little experiment and sent her novel out under a man’s name. The comments on this one are very interesting. When you know that there are more women in the publishing industry but a male name means the project gets looked at faster... um ?

The annual SCBWI LA conference wrapped up this week. Children’s writers who can’t get there drop into the official conference blog where a team of dedicated writers live blog the sessions. It’s always interesting. Grab a coffee scroll down to the bottom and live vicariously.

Publishing Futurist Mike Shatzkin has an interesting post today about the changing nature of publishing. He makes a comment about not seeing any of the big writers jumping from Traditional publishing which a couple of years ago everyone expected. And when are we going to see the United Artists model of publishing? (I’ve been saying for years that the Indie future is in the Bloomsbury model.) I wonder when we will get to say I told you so...

In the Craft Section,

4 steps for organising plot ideas- Jody Hedlund (Bookmark)

3 crucial editing phases

Self editing tips

Emotional wounds- when you accidently kill someone- Angela Ackerman

7 things that will doom your novel

Killing your darlings- Janice Hardy

5 Tips for making writing a daily habit- C S Lakin

What is your characters internal struggle- Margot Dill (Bookmark)

22 experts on overcoming writing challenges

In the Marketing Section,

Changing your marketing mindset- Elizabeth S Craig

Online Marketing strategy for authors – Mike Shatzkin (Bookmark)

When to use pre orders- Lindsay Buroker (Bookmark)

3 tips to improve your pitch –Janice Hardy

22 ways a blog can sell a Non Fiction book- Joel Friedlander

Website of the Week.

I drop into Elizabeth Spann Craig’s blog pretty much every week. Elizabeth is writing about her learning journey as she becomes a hybrid author. This week she had an interesting article about what Traditional publishing needs to get the Hybrids back.

To Finish,

24 things that writers know only from other writers

and

Writers need their own personal heroes Why? Check out these 7 reasons.

(now go and make your list!)

Maureen

@craicer

Pic: Flickr Creative Commons / Ricky Brigante - Malificent